


What Makes You Tick?

by whatsacleverusername



Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU (Comics)
Genre: Angst, Blood, Body Horror, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Kinda, Medical Torture, Medical Trauma, Rivalry, Scarebeast - Freeform, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-06
Updated: 2020-08-06
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:28:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,737
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25740586
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whatsacleverusername/pseuds/whatsacleverusername
Summary: A direct prologue for "A Beast's Heart," with dash of vague insight to the Scarebeast's creation.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6





	What Makes You Tick?

**Author's Note:**

> This is the first time I've really written Pyg in a narrative capacity.

Lazlo has always been a patient man. It came with the trade, spending hours upon hours in the exam rooms, digging around in chest cavities and poking around hearts, lungs, stomachs. Very few things have tried his surgeon’s patience, however, like the man in the cell before him is now. He maintains piercing eye contact, a slight wetness in the corners of his icy eyes being the only betrayal of his capability to feel pain as he remains impossibly stoic despite the livid wounds littering his abdomen, even as another is cut into him with a scalpel. The heart monitor has hardly deviated, his O2 has hardly changed, _he has hardly moved_. Again, the only deviations have been brief and subtle spikes and twitches, attributed to the repeated slicing of his flesh and his obnoxiously well contained fury. The other man in scrubs shoots Lazlo a look over his mask, through the bars, a questioning and somewhat worried glance of _what the hell is this guy made of?_ Lazlo wonders the same. He _has_ been. And he wants answers before he makes use of his captive’s more beastly form, a perfect addition for his troupe and collection of patients, additionally being quite the oddity in either form.

Gesturing for the man in scrubs to move away, Lazlo steps up to the bars of the cell, staring straight across at the prisoner strapped into the metal chair. He finally moves again for the first time in two and a half hours, sitting up right, raising his head to look down his somewhat lumpy, awkwardly shaped nose at Lazlo. Challenging. _Taunting_. Turning the tables, proving himself to be more aggravating than susceptible to such antagonizing. The scarred side of the man’s top lip curls as he studies Lazlo, his lack of clear vision taking nothing away from the pure malice in his glare. A glare that says he wants nothing more than to let go of his control and tear him to shreds. And yet he doesn’t, even as the blood trickles out of his nose despite his face being untouched, even as his already claw-like nails seem to grow as time ticks by.

“Yer very resilient,” Lazlo observes in his slurred voice, unidentifiable accent heavy in his frustration.

He doesn’t reply, looking away only long enough to snap his eyes over to watch the man in scrubs exit the cell, making him jump into the concrete wall and hurry out of the room completely.

“Yih pride yirself on control, yes?” Lazlo continues, drawing the captive’s attention back to him.

Still no reply, other than another annoyed twitch of his lip.

“That cannot last fure’er,” Lazlo states matter-of-factly, teeth hardly parting under the window of his mask. “Yi’re bound to snap, then Pyg will study yih. Figuore out how the Beast works. D’cumint it. _Vivisect it_ until Pyg knouws what he wan’s.”

For a moment, it appears as though the man might finally speak, but he only clenches the muscles in his jaw, a low growl reverberating through the small cell. This seems promising, but a glance at his vitals dashes that hope as soon as it sprouts.

Answering with his own sound of frustration, Lazlo hits a bar with his fist, shouting, “Pyg deemans his anserrs! _Speak_!”

Narrowing his eyes, the man tilts his head to the side, once again appearing to consider what Lazlo has said. Rather than words, a glob of spit carrying blood is shot at him, landing off to the side of Lazlo’s feet. While the aim was shoddy, the message is clear, and this only infuriates Lazlo more.

Before either can make any further move, a knock on the open test chamber door draws both of them to look, the concrete wall of the cell blocking the captive’s view. Despite this, he still snarls again when she speaks.

“How goes it?” Ms. Linda Frittawa asks, strolling into the room just enough to still be out of view from inside the cell.

“He is stubborn,” Lazlo says simply.

“I’m well aware,” she says with a frown, pushing past him to gaze through the bars as well. She studies the captive before a wide, sickening smile spreads across her face and she asks, “Jonathan? Jonathan _Crane_? Is that really you?”

Once again, his lip curls and his eyes narrow, though Linda remains unfazed by the daggers. Lazlo attempts to speak, but she holds up a finger to silence him, still scrutinizing the other rogue in his metal and concrete cage.

“I forgot how good of a look all tied up is for you,” she says with another smile.

Once again, he only growls in reply, glaring at her as if trying to will her body to explode.

“Oh, do you want out?” she asks with mock concern. Crossing her arms, suddenly stern, she adds, “then you’d better do it yourself.”

The only change is a slight uptick on the heart monitor, a direct result of the evident rage boiling in Crane’s eyes.

“He has been like this all night,” Lazlo explains.

Frowning and crossing her arms, visibly thinking, Linda says, “hurt him.”

“Pyg has-” Lazlo tries.

“I can see that,” she snaps. “Hurt him _more_. Beat him, stab him, _wound him_!”

“I’d suffered worse long before I met you,” Crane finally says, still glaring at Linda, voice little more than a seething, goading hiss. “You _both_ have a ways to go before you can so much as compare.”

“Pyg does not compare t’ uthers, he iss _perfec-chin_ ,” Lazlo snaps.

Crane lets the words linger before simply stating, “speech impediment.”

Before Lazlo can retaliate more than hitting the bars again, Linda draws a pistol and fires twice, making the surgeon stumble back briefly. Crane gasps as the bullets tear into his chest, leaving two holes in his shirt in their wake, red rapidly seeping into the fabric and spreading out like a morbid art project. He slumps forward with an exhale, eyes wide open and staring at the floor, mouth ajar as he all but hangs from the straps of the chair. Lazlo’s own eyes stare as the intriguing anatomical mystery fades before him, breathing quickly becoming shallow and heart beating fast enough for the heart monitor to sound as if he’s flat lined.

“Wha’ have yih din?” Answering his own distraught question, Lazlo turns to face Linda and promptly follows, “this was Pyg’s one chaince to lurn about the Beast and yih-”

“Shut up and _watch_ ,” Linda orders, gesturing towards Crane with her pistol.

At first taking only a reflexive glance, Lazlo stares transfixed as Crane’s limp body begins to twitch, soon escalating to writhing as his skin seems to squirm on his bones, his shaking fingers elongating and sharpening. His hair rapidly grows as his limbs, too, elongate, a scream suddenly tearing itself from the man as his head whips up to stare at the ceiling, another as his jaw cracks and blood pours from his nose that has begun changing shape to fuse with his top lip and jaw. The oozing wounds in his chest spurt as his back arches, his ribs rapidly expanding and tearing through the thin fabric of his shirt, more hair rapidly growing down his neck, back, and chest to form a large mane, his pointed ears flattening and molding into the sides of his head. As his bones rearrange themselves with audible pops, creaks, and snaps before their very eyes, ashen gray skin stretched thin over the now protruding skeleton, Linda takes a cautious step back when Lazlo moves forward.

“I’d get back if I were you,” Linda cautions.

Lazlo doesn’t listen, even as a less than human _shriek_ pierces the air in the small chamber, even as gas begins to fume from the wicked beak, even as pure black eyes seem to lock onto him. It isn’t until the creature frees itself with the sound of tearing metal does he think to jump back, long claws attached to longer fingers and arms swiping through the gaps of the bars at both of them. The more he backs away, however, the more the beast tries to push through the bars, until at last the cement they’re anchored in cracks and gives away. Lazlo doesn’t have the reflexes to run as it rears back over both he and Linda with another godawful shriek, claw raised and ready to shred him- Only for another gunshot to send it flinching back, long enough for Linda to push Lazlo out of the way and run towards the door. This time, he has the sense to hurry after her, nearly slamming through the door as she attempts to close it on him.

“Wha’ are yih doing?!” Lazlo shouts as they run.

“Stopping you from digging around my notes,” Linda says, voice muffled by the clear mask covering her nose and mouth.

Lazlo doesn’t have time to wonder what it’s for, the beast ramming through the door and swiping at his legs, easily tripping him and creating a few lines of red on his calves. He’s pinned before he can begin to struggle to stand again, a suffocating cloud from the beast’s maw encompassing him. In mere seconds, he’s screaming louder than he ever has in his life, loud enough to echo down the halls and out the window after Linda, loud enough to have her briefly glance back just long enough to see dark brown and gray barreling towards her. She wastes no time jumping from the window, catching the ledge of the one below and safely pulling herself inside as the beast breaks through the wall above her, plummeting towards the ground.

Looking down after him, she frowns ever so slightly. He’ll be fine, if a bit more in excruciating agony. She made sure of that, and many other things, in her notes. At least _that_ panned out correctly. Still, he’ll be better off than Lazlo once his joints realign themselves post impact… Linda can’t say she’s sorry about this outcome. He was foolish enough to let her help, after all. So long as Lazlo doesn’t get his answers and her secrets, another enemy doesn’t matter. She didn’t spend months copying and fixing up Langstrom’s notes to not keep _her_ beast a mystery. No one can get their hands on him until she figures out how to fix her miscalculation. He will be obedient to her and her _only_ in due time.


End file.
